Classic is dead, long live 9!


News.com reports that Apple has pulled back from their stated plan to sell computers that can not boot Classic from January (ie Macworld San Francisco).

According to details leaking from multiple sources, especially Think Secret -- here and here, Apple will continue to make select hardware that can boot Classic available to educators and Quark users.

Apple has stated that it will continue to offer the eMac, iBook and, oddly, CRT iMac to education customers until June '03.

Also, Apple has said it will continue offering its current dual-G4 line (ie the ones with the crippled CPU bus) until mid-year. This likely will be an acceptable solution for those that have to upgrade assuming that the next crop of PowerMacs don't include dual-channel CPU bus processors.

However, one Quark user quoted by Think Secret summed up the policy sarcastically (and succinctly) in saying, "Yeah, I really want to buy yesterday's Mac so I can run their app" (emphasis included from original).

Editor's note: A band aid on a band aid is what this policy amounts to. We're on a forced march to X to keep some developers happy and give the rest a kick in the butt to complete X versions of their apps. Now that it's obvious Apple is stretching developer resources too far, we get this.